Hosting Providers Targeted by Government

Government agencies are now looking upstream to nail spammers. They’re going after web hosting services.McColo, a U.S. hosting service, was considered a major source of online scams. They provided the means not only for the remote management of compromised computers, but also for the sale of fake security and designer products and child porn sent via email.»»Read more.The volume of spam worldwide actually dropped in November, when the host was taken offline. This happened because of pressure put on the company’s upstream providers. (Many hosts buy data storage capabilities from larger firms. For example, JDoe.com hosting is supplied by NaviSite.)Similarly, 3FN, another web host, was yanked in June. Sorting out the legitimate web customers from the “harmful content” sites takes time, so many legitimate online businesses suffered the impact. Naturally, relationships between the host and the businesses deteriorated.There is a large level of trust (and risk) with a web host. Finding and retaining one that’s consistently “above board” is left to the online business owner.